Two separate New York state homeowners recently found their doors kicked down and were arrested on suspicion of distributing child pornography. In both cases the men were innocent -- the true culprit was a neighbor cybersquatting on their Wi-Fi connection. (Source: UTNE Reader)

Increasingly, cyber-criminals are turning to open networks to commit crimes, including distributing child porn. Government agents often miss clear clues that point that the true suspect might be someone other than the network owner. For example, in one of the N.Y. cases, the culprit had connected on a college network under the same alias -- a lead which would have led officers to a different door, had they followed up on it. (Source: Chicago Title Co.)

At the end of the day about the only thing citizens can do to prevent their house being subjected to a police raid is to secure their wi-fi connections. But even that isn't 100 percent foolproof as secure routers can be hacked. (Source: Chronicle UK)

Homeowners arrested, held and gunpoint for neighbors' child pornography

It's a common practice that seems like
generosity, but could lead to your home being invaded by federal agents.
Recent cases underscore the dangerous nature ofhaving
an unsecured Wi-Fi router.

I. A Rude Awakening

On March 7 at 6:30 a.m. a resident of Buffalo, New
York received the scare of a lifetime. With a thunderous crash his front
door was broken, awaking the man and his wife. Putting a robe on and
rushing downstairs he saw federal agents wearing a strange acronym I-C-E (which
he would later discover stood forU.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement).

An ICE agent charged the stairs, hurling him down
it, leaving him cut and bruised. The man's lawyer, Barry Covert, recalls
the agents screamed at him, "Get down! Get down on the ground!", to
which the man screamed back, "Who are you? Who are you?"

Armed with assault weapons the agents began to
hurl slurs at the injured suspect that gave him the first inclination of what
was going on. "Pedophile!" and "pornographer!" they
screamed.

He dressed at gunpoint in the bathroom and was
escorted to an interrogation room at a government facility. Agents
accused him of using the name "Doldrum" and downloading pornographic
images.

The man was flabbergasted.

He recalls the agent grilling him, stating,
"We know who you are! You downloaded thousands of images at 11:30 last
night."

He recalls arguing, "No, I didn't. Somebody
else could have but I didn't do anything like that."

Unconvinced an agent sneered at him, "You're
a creep ... just admit it."

II. You've Got the Wrong Man!

Only he wasn't a creep.

After having his family's laptops, iPads, and
iPhones seized, federal agents would later conclude that the man was right --
he had no stash of child porn. However, they would later discover that
his 25-year-old neighbor who was accessing the man's Wi-Fi wasdownloading
explicit videos and images.

That neighbor, John Luchetti, was arrested
March 17.

The irony is that if police had conducted a more
thorough initial investigation they likely would have had a far different
encounter with the first man. Mr. Luchetti was tracked down because
"Doldrum" also accessed two internet protocol (IP) addresses at State University of New York at Buffalousing a
secure token. When the university revealed the student's identity,
federal agents realized that the true "Doldrum" was a man living in
an apartment complex very close to their original suspect.

To be fair, Mr. Luchetti himself has pleaded not
guilty to the distribution of child pornography.

The case was a tough one because in theory the
fedscould have done everything right in gaining
warranted entry in the original suspect's home. The feds began their
investigation on February 11 when they received peer-to-peer file transfers
from "Doldrum" and grabbed the IP address.

They tracked the IP downloading the files to that
address, thanks to cooperation from the internet service provider. So in
theory, the homeowner could have been the primary suspect.

On the other hand, as mentioned,
"Doldrum" also connected from other IPs and a thorough investigation
would have revealed that.

U.S. Attorney William Hochul and Immigration and
Customs Enforcement Special Agent in Charge Lev Kubiak reportedly have
apologized to the homeowner.

Amazingly, in today's era of "fast-food
lawsuits" the homeowner is not suing the government. He just wants
to share his story with the media as a warning to other homeowners and to
pressure federal agents to be more thorough in their searches.

III. Unsecured Wi-Fi: Not Uncommon

According to a study conducted by Wakefield Researchon behalf
of theWi-Fi Alliance, approximately 32
percent of adults have used someone's unsecured Wi-Fi connection without their
knowledge or permission. The study, which polled 1,054 Americans age
18 and older, also estimates that America has 201 million Wi-Fi
connections.

Ironically 40 percent of people said they were
more likely to give their house key to someone than their Wi-Fi key. The
admission illustrates the dichotomy between those with some knowledge of
security and those who fail to understand the repercussions of leaving your
virtual door open.

Some understand the risks and willing open their
connections, though.

Rebecca Jeschke, a spokeswoman for theElectronic Frontier Foundation, a San
Francisco-based nonprofit that takes on cyberspace civil liberties issues
argues that people shouldn't be afraid to leave their networks unsecure.
Inan
interviewwith theAssociate Press, she states, "I think it's
convenient and polite to have an open Wi-Fi network. Public Wi-Fi is for
the common good and I'm happy to participate in that — and lots of people
are."

He adds that accessing open networks without
permission is a legal gray area today. He explains, "The question is
whether it's unauthorized access and so you have to say, 'Is an open wireless
point implicitly authorizing users or not? We don't know. The law
prohibits unauthorized access and it's just not clear what's authorized with an
open unsecured wireless."

The Federal government for its part argues that
homeowners shouldn't leave their networks open. The Computer Emergency Readiness Team-- a
federal organization -- suggests users disable their networks from broadcasting
their presence. They also suggest that users change the default passwords
(which are widely known) and keep their routers patched (to prevent exploits).
At the end of the day, though, many users won't have the knowledge and
skills to follow through on such suggestions.

It's also important to consider that there are
ways to break into most consumer "secured" network routers, as well.
Having password-protected encrypted traffic is no guarantee that your
connection is completely safe from savvy cyber-miscreants.

However, it's perhaps best not to make things easy
for abusers by leaving your connection wide open.

Stories of bad experiences are mounting.
A Sarasota, Fla. man had a cybersquatter download tens of thousands
of child porn images from his marina's network by boosting his signal using a
potato chip can. And in North Syracuse, N.Y. a man this spring was
greeted by authorities who suspected he was downloading child porn. It
turned out it was his neighbor, who was arrested April 12.

Aside from law enforcement and child porn,
thousands havereceived
threatsfrom the Recording Industry Association of America and
other industry groups for infringed copyrighted materials that were downloaded
over their connection. Some of these individuals were forced into payouts
totaling thousands of dollars.

The issue of open networks and how law enforcement
should deal with them is an issue that seems certain to only grow as time
passes.

Comments

Threshold

Username

Password

remember me

This article is over a month old, voting and posting comments is disabled

Actually, a supressor for home defense is invaluable. A .223 round or larger puts out enough sonic energy in decibels to cause permanent hearing loss after only a couple of shots when fired indoors in a confined space. When you are lying in bed and an intruder breaks in, are you really going to have time to put earplugs in or put electronic earmuffs on with sound amplification?

Probably not.

Also, what about your family members such as your wife or children? What about their hearing? A supressor allows you to prevent this hearing loss by a significant margin and allow you to focus on defending your surroundings and not worry that if you pull the trigger it might be the last thing you ever hear.

Also, how would the assailant nutcase know who the biggest threat was if people were carrying in a concealed manner? All you have to do is apply for a concealed carry permit and this problem is solved. It isn't hard to do at all.

Yeah, I agree there are some loons that really let it go to their heads. They get the "big man with a gun" syndrome. The problem is, there really isn't any easy way to weed these individuals out--unless you perform some sort of psychological profiling before you allow them to purchase a weapon. Sadly, even some of the greatest psychopaths fall completely under the radar until it is too late, even if they were profiled. You'd also have to get around the barrier of the second amendment which many would argue in court that putting such measures in place violate it.

It's a tough spot. America is full of guns as it is now. All increased gun control does at the moment is harm the people who are innocent who only want to stand up for their families and defend themselves while letting the crazies and criminals get away with whatever they want to do.

It doesn't have to be that tough, a two year service requirement would get everyone at least a bit familiar with small arms and they would have an opportunity to find and classify the clearly defective people.

That said, it sounds like more guns is exactly what is needed if government agents like Immigration use assault weapons to arrest someone for non-violent crimes without any indication that the suspect is dangerous. I still don't know what ICE had to do with this, much like the TSA agent that went to someone's house to seize his computers.

The rule of law and reasonable procedures should apply to law enforcement as well as people. What were the terrorists supposedly after? I think they got it.